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]]>http://jameshannon.com/wp/2014/10/28/nycc2014satcaptcoldlod/feed/0TURNAROUND: Why the Hannon’s changed their minds and got a new kittenhttp://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/08/20/bustersorigin/
http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/08/20/bustersorigin/#commentsTue, 21 Aug 2012 03:04:55 +0000http://jameshannon.com/wp/?p=3340Months back when Cosmo wasn’t doing so hot health-wise, Jackie & I swore we would not get another cat after he passed. We never wanted to go thru the pain of losing a beloved pet ever again. Two days before Cosmo passed away, two kittens just showed up in our backyard and reminded us that all the years of having a healthy Cosmo was worth having to go thru a few months of pain in the end. A month later when we needed a cat around, those same kittens reappeared out of the blue and a chain of events occurred that brought a new kitten into our lives… But not what you might expect… Read on to see why…

FYI: This is a followup to the blog titled Eulogy for a loved pet – Cosmo – RIP 7/2/2012 – If you haven’t read it yet, go check it out – this blog may make more sense knowing the history, but this blog can stand alone if you don’t have time.. This particular blog isn’t going to get advertised much since its pretty personal, so if you found it, then you’re just awesome.

Back around Thanksgiving 2011, our 15 year old cat Cosmo began having some ear infections and neurological issues that began a decline in health that ended with his passing on July 2nd, 2012. It was a rough time period for Jackie & myself, and we saw our beloved Cosmo slowly deteriorate. It was a painful time for us…So painful in fact that Jackie & I vowed to never get another pet afterwards… We never wanted to go thru that again…

And we maintained that attitude up until June 30th – Two days before Cosmo passed away on July 2nd…

What changed our mind? Read on…

On June 30th, Jackie & I were going about our business while Cosmo was sleeping – which he did a lot of around that time… We happened to look out the window into our back yard and there were two kittens out there just playing. We’ve had quite a few stray cats in our yard before, but these two were different. First off they were just kittens who couldn’t have been over a month old… And they were just “playing.” Jackie & I stood there watching them play with a leaf for about 10 minutes. I can’t begin to describe how therapeutic the simple joy of watching kittens play can be. We were reminded of all the good times we had watching Cosmo grow up…

After Cosmo passed, and I posted the blog with all the Facebook photos from Cosmo’s life, I remembered just how important Cosmo was to Jackie & myself and how much better our life had become with him. And that the almost 16 years of good times was worth the 6-months of torture watching him slip away…

So we made the decision that we would indeed get another cat after some time passed. We were thinking at least 3-4 months however.

Fast forward a month later to July 31st. And what did Jackie see in our house that morning? A MOUSE! Now if you know Jackie, you know she’s deathly afraid of these things… (see the Cosmo Slayer Video to see her very real reaction to a mouse in our house years earlier). But instead of fear, Jackie (and I) became angry… How dare this mouse disrespect Cosmo?!? He wasn’t even gone a month?! (Emotions are simply not logical, we do realize this LOL)

We got some traps and caught the mouse by the time we got home from work… And when we got home, what did we see? Those same two kittens that were around before. They were a little bigger after a month, but it was definitely them…

I know its a stretch, but we kinda took this as the universe sending us a message.. What drove the message home further was that the next day we caught a baby mouse (and you know there wouldn’t just be one)… And those kittens were out back again… We were so tempted to bring those kittens in to get the scent of cat in the house again (and maybe more)

So I spoke to the wise sage Anna Zelikman (who was Cosmo’s original human Mom), and she passed this bit of smart advice to me: (paraphrased slightly since I cant remember the exact words)

“The next time the kittens are around, approach them slowly and see what happens… If they come up to you, then they might make good pets… If they run, they are probably too “wild” to make good pets…”

Seemed logical – especially knowing they were living in the street for at least a month now. So the next day (Aug 2nd), I got home from work and saw the kittens lounging in my driveway… I called Jackie from the car, and told her to watch what happens as I approached…

The kittens were at the other end of the driveway – about 40 feet away. I took ONE step towards them. And the two of them just bolted away. So we had our answer on those two particular kittens.

But when I got inside, I could tell Jackie was bummed. Honestly, so was I… We talked about it for a bit, and I found out she was really hoping that things would have worked out with them. We realized that we both still missed having a fuzzball around the house. Sure, the mouse repellent aspect was the immediate and logical reason, but it was so many more reasons that we didn’t appreciate until Cosmo was gone.

So after some debate, we decided that we were ready for a new cat… I got on Facebook within an hour or two of this decision, and one of the first things I saw was this tiny kitten picture. I figured it was a LOLCat – but there was no cutesy comment on the picture… I saw that one of my FB friends had just found a tiny 4-5 week old kitten locked in her Bronx apartment building’s basement laundry room and she rescued it.

So I emailed. And thru a series of emails with Carmen Corrigan and her son Ken, we arranged to meet the little cat a week later.

During the interim week, Carmen sent pictures and video of the little cat that they named Buster. And Jackie & I were getting more and more excited by the day. It struck me during this week that Buster was found a few blocks away from the Williamsbridge Oval Park – which is known simply as “The Oval” to local residents. This fact is important for two reasons.

1) I used to live nearby and when we were kids, my friend and I would ride our bikes past this building on our way up to the Oval every day after school. We used to have acorn fights there (swinging on the swings and whipping acorns at each other as we swung by – we were dumb kids – but it was fun LOL)

2) This location falls in the area known as Ducky Boy Territory. For those of you who don’t know what the Ducky Boys are, its a gang from this area in the early 1960’s. They were fictionalized in Richard Price’s great book and later 1979 movie “The Wanderers”, and I wrote a book about them called Lost Boys of the Bronx – The Oral History of the Ducky Boys Gang (available on Amazon and personally signed copies are available at my Lantern-Media.com site)

Knowing Buster was from this area (and officially a “Ducky Cat”), and the timing of Carmen’s original post was everything we needed to know that Buster was the right cat for us.

On Aug 9th, we drove up to the Bronx to meet Buster. It was very apparent that Carmen and Ken had taken great care of Buster during the week. Buster was quite healthy and had grown a bit from the initial pictures a week earlier. They had even taken Buster to the vet for a checkup – He was fine outside the normal problems for a rescue cat – ear mites, fleas and parasites. The vet cleared the problems up by the time we got there.

The vet also confirmed that Buster was indeed a boy cat. None of us were sure before, and while we loved the name Buster, we didn’t think it would work if Buster was a girl… Happily it worked out. For the record, had Buster turned out to be a girl, we would have called her “Chloe D. Cat” – (as in one of my favorite characters from Smallville)

We pretty much knew Buster was coming home with us even before we walked in the apartment that day. But seeing that little face in person, Jackie & I melted. He was the cutest little guy and was so playful. Within the hour or so we spent there, he had gotten used to us to the point where he was falling asleep on my arm…

It was really great meeting Carmen and Ken, and we could see that they took really good care of Buster and gave him a lot of love… I could definitely see sadness in them as we left to bring Buster home. Jackie & I joked in the car that we needed to make plans for a vacation soon, so they could babysit Buster for a week.

So as I finish writing this blog, its been exactly a week since we got Buster home from the Bronx. And its been a week of changes. Most nights are spent continuing to kitty proof every room. We thought we did pretty well before Buster got here, but the little booger still finds ways to get into trouble… LOL

But seriously, its been great having Buster around. Watching this little fuzzball innocently explore, play and pounce are some of of the simple joys of life. While he still has a way to go to get into our heart as deep as Cosmo did, he is definitely on the right track. Buster does not have the same personality as Cosmo, and that’s perfectly fine with us. He’s got a great “different” personality and we plan to love and appreciate him forever.

As if you couldn’t figure that out, Buster will definitely be a loved and spoiled cat in our house. Thanks to Carmen and Ken Corrigan for rescuing him from a tragic fate and giving him a great introduction to kind humans. Thanks to Anna Zelikman for some wise advice. Thanks to those two Scotch Plains kittens that showed up on two days that Jackie and I really needed them. And thanks to Cosmo for showing us that having a cat around is one of the great joys of life.

]]>http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/08/20/bustersorigin/feed/0Eulogy for a loved pet – Cosmo – RIP 7/2/2012http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/07/12/eulogyforalovedpet/
http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/07/12/eulogyforalovedpet/#commentsThu, 12 Jul 2012 04:03:48 +0000http://jameshannon.com/wp/?p=3269Some blogs are written for other people. Some are just written purely for myself (and Jackie). This is one from that latter category. You are more than welcome to read it, and if it makes you smile, or helps you get over a similar experience, all the better. If you are one of those people that go “It’s just a cat, get over it.”, you may want to skip this blog, it’s gonna get a bit sappy. You’ve been warned…

Last Monday, July 2nd, Jackie & I lost our little buddy – Cosmo D. Cat Hannon. Old age, ear tumors and the first real heat wave of Summer 2012 proved to be too much for him, and we had to take him to the vet to be euthanized. He was in pretty bad shape, and it was the right decision – even though it was one of the most horrible days in our lives.

I don’t really want to dwell on the sadder aspects of Cosmo’s final days in this blog. If I forget the sadder parts of this story later in life, I’m kinda fine with it. But I just want this to make me remember the good times with as much clarity as I have now.

Shortly after his passing, I went to post a picture of him on Facebook in honor of him. But when I went to look for the “right” picture, I found a whole lotta other pictures of him that I loved. I’m not going to lie, I went a little (ok, a lot) overboard. I eventually found and posted 34 or so pictures of Cosmo that Jackie & I loved. (See the bottom of this blog and my Facebook link).

While looking thru the pictures, I found a great benefit – it gave me something to do as opposed to sitting at home thinking about how horrible I felt. What I didn’t realize at the time, was that in finding all these pictures of Cosmo throughout his life, it made me really happy that we had him for all those years.

So, I just wanted to take some space and tell Cosmo’s history, and some of his highlights over the years.

Pre-Cosmo Days
Back in mid-1996, Jackie and I had been married and living in our house for 3 years… And the unthinkable happened – we had our first mouse. Jackie was (is?) petrified of the varmints, so she didn’t appreciate it one bit. People told us that the best way to keep mice away is to get a cat – Well duh, that’s a bit of common sense, but as we were talking about getting a pet anyway, it put things in motion…

So we went to the Newark animal shelter the next day and picked up a kitten. She was 8 weeks old and so cute that we called her “Precious.” We got her home and she was a bit timid, but we figured she would get used to us… She didn’t eat the first night which the shelter vet said was normal, but she didn’t eat the next day either. We called the shelter and they said to hold off a bit – that when she got really hungry, she’d eat… Another whole day went by and she didn’t eat, so we took her to the shelter vet who pulled out “special” food (Its been 16 years, and I long forgot the name)

As soon as the vet put the food down, Precious scarfed down the entire plate. OK, cool, we just needed the right food… So we took a few cans of this special food, and went home… And tried to feed her the next morning as per vets orders… And still no eating.. Called them back, and they said to wait another day to see if Precious would eat.

Next day, still no eating so we took her to the vet. The same thing happened – same food we tried to feed her, and she scarfed it down… The vet gave us something else to try (forgot what) and we took her home. Same thing – no eating…

So Jackie and I made the decision to take her back to the shelter. We didn’t want to be responsible for starving this poor kitten to death… It wasn’t an easy decision, but it was the right thing, and Precious was pretty cute, so she’d have no problem being re-adopted…

We never saw (or heard about) Precious ever again, but it really shook Jackie’s & my confidence in being a pet owner…

As a postscript, we caught that damn mouse that caused this whole sequence of events.

Cosmo’s Entrance
Flash forward to December 1996, and we had given up considering having a pet. I was working in the city, and taking the train home with my good friend Leon – who also worked in the city and lived in the next town to us. Jackie would pick us up at the train, and we’d drop him off at his sister’s house, and then head home. Many nights we would just hang and BS outside of the house before we left.

This one night in December was pretty cold, and it was even snowing a bit – but that never stopped us from standing out there yapping. All of a sudden, out of the darkness came this little creature. Jackie saw it first and screamed because she thought it was a huge rat. I looked over and thought it was a baby raccoon. Leon the Brave went over and picked it up.

And it was this adorable creature you see below

He was just a kitten – maybe 6 to 8 weeks old. We looked around to see if his mom or siblings were around, but he was by himself. Leon the Rescuer decided to take him inside because he probably wouldn’t have survived the cold snowy night otherwise.

Leon, and his sister Anna (Cosmo’s first Mom) took care of the little guy for a day or two, and then started bugging Jackie & I to take him. Leon knew about our confidence problem after Precious, but didn’t care. I told them that I didn’t want to get attached to the little bugger and then find out its some little kid’s cat who was devastated by the loss of his/her new kitten. Leon and Anna said that they would put up posters, and if nobody responded, Jackie & I would take the cat.

Cosmo becomes a Hannon
After a week or so (where I suspiciously didn’t see any posters around town), Jackie & I took possession of the little cat “temporarily”. We had to make sure he would eat for us… We needn’t have worried, that little kitten was a bottomless pit of food… He was always hungry and ready to eat… And after a few minutes in our house, he became “permanent”….

We took him to the vet (Dr. Schaefer in Scotch Plains, NJ – highly recommended) shortly after to have him checked out. Doc found out that he had worms from eating a bird or mouse while on the street – but they went away quickly with some meds. For the most part, he was fine – Doc even said that he was one of the strongest kittens he had seen. He even suggested that this little guy had some bobcat in his lineage (which led me to research a breed called the Pixie-Bob. He had a long tail, but the rest of the description of this breed fits in with some of Cosmo’s quirky, but loveable personality.

And thus, we began our career as Cosmo’s parents…

Naming Cosmo

I never thought naming a cat would be so difficult. This poor little cat went thru two weeks of being named “Fuzzball” before we settled on a real name. As much as I tried, Jackie just didn’t want his name to be FuzzBall. So we waited for his name to come naturally to us…

And waited…

One day, my childhood friend Raymond was over, and we were talking about how much this cat looked like Raymond’s old cat “Gizmo” – who was a pretty cool cat. So we were joking about naming him Gizmo II or Gizmo Jr. Jackie would have none of that, but we decided we had to name him soon or we were going with “Fuzzball” – So the three of us sat down and thought…

Cosmo was having a particularly nutty day as kittens tend to have – running around seeing invisible ghosts and then tearing ass in the opposite direction every few seconds… I don’t remember who said it, but someone said he was a cosmo-nut… Which sparked something… And with the closeness of Cosmo to Gizmo and his nutty little personality, it just fit…. And the fuzzball became “Cosmo” – years later after loving the Homey D. Clown sketch on “In Living Color”, we add the D. Cat part as a goof that just kinda stuck….

As an aside: We used to love watching “Seinfeld”, so people always thought we named Cosmo after “Cosmo” Kramer on the show… But it was kinda the opposite – There was an argument that day about not wanting to name him Cosmo because of the Kramer character. Eventually we all agreed that Cosmo was the perfect name for him and if people associated it with Seinfeld, it was ok – we knew better…

As Cosmo grew, he got himself into a bunch more adventures. The years have blended together, so I may have the time frame off, but the stories will live on in legend… I could probably go on for many more pages, but here’s a small sampling:

Turkey Lust
The first Thanksgiving that we had Cosmo, Jackie and her Mom (who was staying over for the holiday) were preparing a kickass Turkey with all the trimmings. We didn’t notice it at first, but as the smell of the food increased, so did Cosmo’s erratic behavior. As expected, he was in the kitchen a lot – but soon he was meowing up a storm. Jackie was at the sink seasoning the turkey (or something), when all of a sudden she felt her pants coming down. And I was upstairs.

It seems the turkey smell got to the little Fuzzball and he wanted it NOW… So he decided to try to climb Jackie’s leg to get to it. But her sweatpants were loose, and they just came down. Undeterred, he sank his little claws into Jackie’s leg to make another attempt to climb up, but her scream of pain scared him off.

When I heard the scream and ran down to see what was happening, Jackie & her Mom told me and I saw the little clawmark on Jackie’s leg, and I burst out laughing. It was one of the funniest things I had ever heard and the legend of Cosmo’s Turkey Lust was born!

Cosmo Becomes a Star
I sent one of the pictures I took of Cosmo into the “365 Cats a Year” Calendar for 2000, and it was accepted! So our cat was now a Star!!!

(its not easy to take a picture of a page inside a calendar thats 12 years old and you dont want to break the spine)

As a quick aside to this, after digging up the calendar to find the year, I realized that I was wrong about the picture I thought it was… For years I always thought it was this picture: (which I’ve always considered one of my best pictures)

The Slash EscapeThere was only one time in the almost-16 years we had him, that I got mad at Cosmo – and that was when he slashed my hand open.

During the warmer months, he liked to make a break for freedom when the front door was opened. He had free reign of the backyard deck which was enclosed, but he always made a run for the front door when he could. 99% of the time we stopped him, but every so often, he’d catch us off guard and get out.

Now since he was an indoor cat, the second he made it out the front door, he panicked and became a different cat. He’d jump into the area behind the bushes and not want to come out. We’d try to coax him out with treats, his favorite toy, or his favorite food – turkey! More often than not it was a patience game that Jackie was a LOT better at than I was.

One particular time, he got out at a bad time where I had to rush off for something. So when he went into the bushes, I went in after him. And as panicking cats are known to do, he hissed at me. Being that this was a gentle cat normally, I ignored his threat and kept going and reached in. And the little bugger slashed at me – and got my hand — causing a pretty nasty cut. Which didn’t help my mood at the time.

I ran inside to get the fishing net to capture him like I saw on Planet of the Apes when I was younger, and luckily Jackie was there. She realized what happened and calmed me down and took me to the bathroom to dress my wound. Then when I was ok, she went outside with that calm teacher patience, and coaxed Cosmo inside.

Thinking back all these years later, I Still smile as I remember him coming in and start brushing up against my leg as if to say he was sorry. But I wasn’t having any of that… I showed him my bandaged hand and turned my back on him. Yes, I was fighting with my cat, but I was mad

For over an hour he sat near me – hoping I would acknowledge him. But I wouldn’t. At one point, I looked over at him to see what he was doing and he looked at me and opened his mouth but didn’t make any noise. And it broke my heart, so I reached down and picked him up and gave him a gentle lecture while petting him, and we were cool after that. I just made sure to be more careful opening the door in the future, and let Jackie get him if he actually did make it out.

The Snow Escape
Another time he escaped, but had a much different experience…

It was a cold winter day and there was at least a foot of snow on the ground from a recent snowfall. Leon was over, and we were running around bringing stuff into the house. We didn’t actually notice that Cosmo escaped out the front door and just went about with whatever we were immersed in.

An hour or so later, we were about to go out to the car to get something and there’s this cat on our front stoop in one of the few places that there wasn’t snow or ice. He was just looking out at the cars. He looked an awful lot like Cosmo, but he was in the house sleeping – right??

So we went around the house looking for him and couldn’t find him anywhere. So we went to look at the cat again, and this time he was facing the door with the most insulted face I’d ever see on a cat. We opened the door and he strutted in completely ignoring us and walked over to the radiator to warm up…

It took him a while to forgive us for (a) not noticing that he snuck out and (b) making him freeze his butt off out there… But with each offering of food or treats, he forgave us a little bit more. And he stopped trying to escape in the winter LOL

Cosmo Slayer
One year we had another mouse in the house one chilly evening. I found out about it after seeing Jackie scream from the couch after seeing it. She got up and ran into the dining room and literally stood on a chair in fright. Cosmo tore ass away to a safe spot after hearing Jackie’s blood curdling yell…

I did what any husband would do… I ran upstairs and grabbed the video camera as I was just starting to make and edit small films with my new Apple Mac. I came downstairs with a fresh tape filming Jackie standing on the chair.

Then our hero Cosmo emerged. He saw that the problem was a mouse and he pulled up his little furpants and went to work. He did everything you would expect a cat to do – he pounced on it and played a game of cat and mouse with it. All while I had the video camera rolling.

Eventually the mouse started “playing dead”, but Cosmo knew better – he would poke it and it would run away… I started feeling bad for the mouse, so I scooped him up in a garbage pail (he was still quite alive) and eventually threw him out into the yard to fight another day…

And here is the footage I edited back then(It was one of the first videos I edited, and you can hear
the click of the computer mouse after every sentence LOL)

Cat-in-LawsMy Dad loved Cosmo from the moment he first met him. It kinda surprised me as we didn’t have any pets growing up. I always assumed he just tolerated other people’s cats and dogs. I remember him not being a big fan of ferrets – he said that when he was younger, his(?) dogs in Ireland would chase them into their holes and that the ferrets (or maybe weasels) would go after his chickens. Either way, not a fan…

But when he first met Cosmo, I remember Cosmo instantly taking a liking to my Dad. Maybe it was the Hannon aura, or maybe my Dad knew enough to bribe him with some cat treats, but they became friends quickly that day. Whenever my Dad called, he always asked about how Cosmo was doing…

One year, we went to California for a week, and we needed a catsitter. So we asked my Dad if he could watch him for us. My Dad said sure, and we brought him up to the Bronx to stay with him. I could tell my Dad was a little nervous about it, but he did it… When I called him that night after we got home, I could tell the nervousness was gone – Cosmo had made himself at home and had my Dad wrapped around his little paw getting treats or being played with.

When we got back from California, and went to pick Cosmo up, my Dad was really bummed seeing Cosmo leave. He kept telling me what a “Gentleman Cat” Cosmo was and that he was welcome there anytime. I almost didn’t want to take Cosmo away from him Hell I almost bought my Dad a kitten, but he warned me not to…

Heres a shot from when my Dad stayed over the house, When we woke up in the morning, Cosmo was waiting outside the door of my Dad’s bedroom. So we let him in. And he put his paws up on the bed and started pawing at my Dad’s face wanting to be played with, Im glad I had the camera nearby

Jackie’s Mom was a harder sell. While she liked Cosmo, she was really nervous around him. I think she had a bad experience with a cat when she was younger. Cosmo sensed this and gave her some space… At least early on.

Over the years, Cosmo grew on her and they developed a mutual respect for each other. Jackie’s Mom would give him cat treats, and he would sit on the couch next to her and stare at her until she switched seats He knew he had the upper hand in this relationship LOL

When Cosmo passed away last Monday, Jackie told me that her Mom was crying for Cosmo – She really is going to miss him. As we all are…

Which brings me to a bummer part of this story which I’m going to skim thru because like I said earlier, this is a celebration of Cosmo’s life, not the sadness of his death.

But this next story is important to the celebration of his life this year…

Crappy Thanksgiving 2011

The Sunday before Thanksgiving 2011, Cosmo started acting “different” one evening – he just started pacing the house in circles for hours. He wouldn’t stop until I picked him up. And just he kept doing it. We called Doc Schaefer’s answering service late that evening but he wasn’t around. But they suggested the local Animal Hospital in Iselin, NJ. We took Cosmo to the hospital at 1am on a Sunday night, and they poked and prodded him and wanted to send him deep down the Jersey Shore for tests the next day.

We were going to do it, until we talked to Doc Schaefer in the morning. Doc smartly told us that Cosmo was a 15 year old cat who had ear tumors, so these tests would be expensive ($1600) and probably require surgery that a 15 year old cat wouldn’t do well with… He just cleaned out Cosmo’s ears, gave him some antibiotics and a b12 shot and sent him home.

We thought we were going to lose him that day. I remember Cosmo being groggy, butat one point, he walked up to both Jackie & I on the couch and rubbed his head against our legs. We lost it… We really thought he was saying goodbye…

Happily, whatever Doc did to him seemed to really perk him up. He still paced, but there was a spring in his step again. Over the next couple of days, I could notice him getting much better… Doc seemed to think that he had an ear infection that was causing the pain on that Sunday and the anti-biotic cleared it up. Jackie & I were very relieved!

But after this incident, Cosmo wasn’t the same cat.

During the winter, Cosmo would sit next to the radiator with his right ear resting on it. It didn’t seem to burn him, so we let him do it… Cosmo moved slower these days, and became more of a lap cat than he ever was. In the past, he’d tolerate me picking him up, but once I stopped petting him, he was on his way… A weird thing is that the tumors in his right ear disappeared! I dont know how, but resting against the radiator worked for him.

Not that we needed reminding to love our Cosmo, but this crappy event made us realize that Cosmo was on borrowed time and really made us appreciate him even more. We treated him well before that week in November, but afterwards, that cat was the most spoiled creature in the universe…

We were really lucky to have Cosmo as long as we did… It was a horrible horrible day last Monday, but its just nature. Until we can make cats and dogs live 40-50 years, its just the way it is and we can’t do anything about it.

The week before Cosmo passed, I was dead-set against ever getting a new cat because of the horrible feelings from the week. But after looking thru all the pictures of Cosmo’s life, I realized that a few horrible weeks is a small price to pay for 15+ years of pure joy.

I won’t be getting a new cat anytime soon – Jackie & I still need to grieve for Cosmo for a while. Trying to replace him with a new kitten would just be disrespectful to him…

If you got this far thru my blog, I salute you – I know it was a long read – Hell it took me 3-4 days of writing it… But once I started writing it, I just kept adding to it… One day in the (hopefully far) future where my memory is starting to go, I’d love to read this and remember just how important this little fuzzball was to Jackie & I during the last 15+ years.

But if you read thru this completely, thank you… As a reward, I wont hit you with any salespitches now… They’re in my other entries if you REALLY want to see them…

I will leave you with a gallery of cool cosmo pictures and this video clip of Cosmo & I taken a few months ago, when he wasn’t feeling so hot and I was hugging him on my chest. It may be sappy, but I’m really glad I had the camera rolling to keep this clip forever…

]]>http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/07/12/eulogyforalovedpet/feed/8Weird Coincidences: The Ducky Boys and Costuming.http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/06/10/duckyboys_costumingcoincidence/
http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/06/10/duckyboys_costumingcoincidence/#commentsMon, 11 Jun 2012 02:48:15 +0000http://jameshannon.com/wp/?p=3199Author James Hannon finds out that his Bronx/Ducky Boys World and his Costuming World are starting to blend together in very strange & coincidental ways. This looks like a job for SuperGirl – who was instrumental in uncovering this string of coincidences. Sound interesting? Read on……

Well, so far every big project I’ve worked on has had at least one huge coincidence that made me realize I might be onto something really cool.

For my 2004 documentary, Out of Our Dens: The Richard & the Young Lions Story, while looking for Detroit names who remembered the band RYL, I came across legendary NYC radio DJ Pat St John – who unbeknownst to me was a legendary Detroit radio DJ before coming to NY and not only did he remember the band, he LOVED them. And while thats cool, thats not the coincidence part. The coincidence part is that when I spoke to him and invited him out to the bands rehearsal studio to see them play, we found out that HE LIVED FOUR BLOCKS AWAY. Pat became one of the biggest champions for RYL and my documentary afterwards, and more importantly one of my good friends…

For my 2010 book Lost Boys of the Bronx: The Oral History of the Ducky Boys Gang, I came across Kevin Byrne, who was the younger brother of two of the founding members of the Ducky Boys Gang – twins Jimmy & Frankie Byrne. When I went to interview Kevin, we interviewed in the house that they all grew up in on Briggs Ave in the Norwood section of the Bronx. The coincidental part was that this house was 300 feet from the building that I lived in growing up. I remember going trick or treating at this house as a kid (and was told that I was lucky to walk away with my pants) – I’m about 18 years younger than the actual Ducky Boys, but I walked by this house tens of thousands of times without realizing that the occupants would influence my career/life so many years later. And also Kevin & I are now good friends as well…

There was also some big coincidences involving The RiffSurfers band that I used to manage, Star Wars costuming and Pat Dinizio of the band The Smithereens. That one was so big that it took up two blog entries and a few Youtube videos to tell it all… Read about that one here since its way to long to explain in a paragraph. LOL

I met Ann McManus right after NY Comic Con 2011. An idiot writer for a major health magazine (I wont give them an ounce of publicity) thought it would be funny to his readers if he trashed costumers who weren’t the perfect size/weight for their costumes. Happily, there was a HUGE backlash from the ever-growing costuming community and the magazine backpedaled. They didn’t do a great job apologizing, but they were certainly put on notice that the costuming community is larger than they thought, and we stick up for each other. Ann and I were vocal on a thread of a mutual friend and started talking. I saw that she was an amazing costumer and made her own very intricate costumes, so I asked her if she would like to be interviewed. I found out during this interview that she was also from the Bronx, so we went off on a lot of conversational tangents about the Bronx.

Flash-forward to last weekend (6/3/2012) and I saw that we were both going to be at Wizard World Philadelphia 2012 (also know as Philadelphia Comic Con), so I wanted to meet her in person and get a picture with her. She was in a very cool Super Girl costume (that you see at the top of this article) and we had a pleasant conversation, and got the picture. We took the picture, and went about our merry ways… I posted a ton of pix on Facebook here – The pictures got some attention from my friends, but nothing out of the ordinary.

Flash forward to this week, and while posting pix from the Roller Derby event I did with the 501s Northeast Remnant, one of my friends found the Philly Comic Con pix and commented on the picture I took with Ann. As we all know Facebook is kinda goofy, and somehow put that pic on a lot of my Facebook friends page which got more attention today than it did last week when I first posted it. And apparently it got posted on Ann’s friends pages as well… To the point that her husband understandably asked who this geeky guy was.

She explained that she had helped me with an interview for my new book on costuming, and that I had written a book on the Bronx about a gang called the Ducky Boys… He responded (probably very shocked, but I wasn’t there to see his reaction) that he actually used sections of MY BOOK “Lost Boys of the Bronx” to teach his students. Ann explained that he’s a high school English teacher in the Bronx and that he said he uses the book because its of local interest and they like street culture. And that he’s actually trying to get it into his official curriculum… All this without knowing that Ann was helping me out on my new book about costuming.

You literally could’ve knocked me over with a feather. This coincidence wouldn’t even make a good fictional plot because it would be too unbelievable.. It just goes to show that the world is a LOT smaller than you might think…

A smaller coincidence of note is that Ann’s husband is a costumer too, and had a great Black Adam costume at Philly Comic Con the week before – And I have been reading a Black Adam graphic novel in small pieces over the last few weeks – and was impressed with his costume in her pictures – before I realized that was her husband. Its cool, but not as jaw-droppingly coincidental as the big one…

Well, thats my story tonight. I hope that Ann and her husband and I become good friends over the coming years like Pat & Kevin from the first two projects. But we’ll let that work itself out organically :

Now for the shameless plugs… I put it at then end so you could skip it if you’d like… LOL

First off, I wrote a Book last year, called Lost Boys of the Bronx: The Oral History of the Ducky Boys Gang. It is about the real-life exploits of the Ducky Boys gang that was so terrifying in the 1979 movie The Wanderers. They also happened to roam the Bronx neighborhood that I grew up in in the early 1960s.

Secondly, I am currently writing a new book about the really cool people I have met doing this costuming thing. There are a lot of interesting stories about how and why people got into this hobby. Many people get into it for the nerdy and fun aspect of the hobby, but there is so much more to it – For example, The 501st and Rebel Legion devotes a LOT of time and energy into helping people (especially kids) who need it – Any given weekend, there are members of our group visiting hospitals, participating in charity walks and raising money and awareness for a variety of organizations (Make A Wish, FAAN, Autism Speaks, amongst many others) – So we’re not just geeks – we’re geeks that really try to make the world a better place…

Anyway, in this new book, I am looking for interesting stories of people who costume. It could be Star Wars or Star Trek related; It could be Superhero costuming; It could be Renaissance Faire, SCA or even LARPing; it could be Historical Re-Enacting; If you put a costume on outside of Halloween, I’d love to hear your story – so please drop me a line at JamesHannon@Lantern-Media.com – you could end up immortalized in a book. But please hurry – before I finish writing it.

And the third and final advertisement… I’ve been writing this blog for a while now, and there’s a lot of variation in my topics… There’s quite a few more costuming stories, some Bronx and Ducky Boys stories, reviews of movies, and concerts that I’ve been to, and tips for writers and/or procrastinators… Take a look thru the rest of them – I’m sure you’ll find something that interests you.

See, that wasn’t so bad was it? Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time!

-=James

]]>http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/06/10/duckyboys_costumingcoincidence/feed/0Estate Sales – An education over two Saturdays.http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/03/18/estatesaleseducation/
http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/03/18/estatesaleseducation/#commentsSun, 18 Mar 2012 18:42:18 +0000http://jameshannon.com/wp/?p=3124James and Jackie get caught up in the estate sale mania that is going on in reality TV and spend two weekends experiencing it. And they learned a few things on why it isn’t for the faint of heart.

Well, for the last few weeks, Jackie & I have been hitting estate sales here in Central and Northern New Jersey. This is a new thing for us as we have never even really hit garage or yard sales since moving to NJ from the Bronx in 1993. We just didn’t think it was what respectable people did.

Well, reality TV changed all that for us. Every pawn shop and antiques reality show had these stories of people finding tremendous deals at estate sales. Even one of our new favorite shows – Kevin Smith’s “Comic Book Men” showed the main characters finding big scores at garage sales and the Collingwood Flea Market. So Jackie and I decided to check out this suburban phenomena. And we lived to tell the tale.

We started our expeditions at the Collingwood Flea Market Mall in Farmingdale, NJ after seeing it on Comic Book Men. The characters on the show said that “the people who went to this mall were not allowed in regular malls” – and that was enough to pique our curiosity. And after asking around, we found it was a “ghetto mall” (which are usually awesome) where you could find “anything” – from brass knuckles, swords, and grappling hooks (seriously), to Nazi paraphernalia (we think – we didnt go in that section as it looked too shady). This is the type of mall where you could find the million-dollar first issue of Superman idly lying on a shelf under a bong lamp. Jackie & I learned a lot about what the “real” NJ Shore was this first weekend.

But alas, we didn’t find anything that we could re-sell to make millions on our trip. So we decided to do some estate sales browsing instead. We found a website with a list of em, and we mapped out about 14 of em spanning two Saturdays and off we went.

And we learned stuff in our estate sales travels… The two separate days we went out, we had two separate types of experiences, so I will split them out

Saturday #1Estate Sales Shopping is a completely new experience for us, so we didn’t know what to expect.

Here’s the rundown of what we learned this first Saturday….

You will feel your own mortality instantly.
Its called an estate sale for a reason – Chances are the owners had died and the family is selling off their crap to make money off stuff that they’d probably throw away or donate otherwise.

One of the first feelings I felt at my first estate sale was that one-day there will be masses of clueless people traipsing thru MY stuff looking to see if there was anything worth anything. And that just depressed the hell out of me – I dont think I believe in the “those with the most toys at the end, wins” philosophy.

But the depression about your mortality will wear off when you hit your next emotion…

You will feel like a vulture picking through people’s stuff.

The depression will be replaced by disgust that you are picking thru deceased people’s stuff. Watch the first minute of this clip of Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol to get an idea of what I felt like going thru this stuff…

But after you digest all feelings of disgust, you start to justify what you’re doing… And it does work for a bit..

This is a wonderful experience for an aspiring writer looking for character inspiration.

At any given point, you are walking into the lives of people you have never met and seeing the total accumulation of their life laid out in front of you. And without knowing anything else about the people who owned the house, you can piece together a semblance of their life.

For example, one of the houses, there was a lot of camera equipment, golf equipment, and African and Asian folk art and stuff. Without knowing much more, you start to put together a life profile of these people – They were world-travelers with no kids accustomed to the finer things in life. The husband was a successful businessman who was an avid golfer. The wife was a bored housewife who fancied herself an art collector and photographer. They spent their entire life together except for a short period when the husband strayed with his gold-digging secretary. The wife eventually forgave him, but kept him on a short leash. Eventually the wife developed cancer, and the husband took care of her till the end and passed shortly after. I have no idea if any of the facts are true, but it is for a fictional character, so I’m fine LOL

Another house had tons of watchmaking equipment. This was inspiration for a strict Swiss-German watch repairman in a mall store like Zales who came into work only two days a week. But he was always tinkering at home who was very distant from his wife who drank a lot.

And so on. The sky is the limit on the characters you can come up with.

But eventually, you’ll see something that will depress you again.

One house had paintings of the owners up around the house. They weren’t very good, so I’m thinking it was done by a fledgling artist family member. And the paintings were FOR SALE for like $20. So basically these people had absolutely nobody to leave these personal paintings to. Nobody wanted to remember Mom and Dad (or Grandma and Granddad)… That $20 price tag was one of the saddest things I’d ever seen, and I kinda had to get out of there shortly afterwards.

Well that was weekend #1 where all these new experiences sank in. We decided to go back the next weekend to see if it would be any different now that we knew what to expect… It was…

Saturday #2:We became a bit jaded to the emotions experienced last weekend and decided to see if there was any hope of making money

This is more of a list of what we learned with experience to get the most out of your estate sales shopping

If you don’t get there in the first hour. you probably won’t find anything worthwhile.

Before the estate sale, you have the relatives going thru the house with first pick at anything. Then you get the company that runs the sale getting second pick… Then they’ll probably bring in antique shops and specialty shops in to see if they can get good prices for other items…

Then the estate sale opens – And there are a LOT of people who go to these sales. And some of these people are professionals who have a second nature of what is valuable and whats not. And they scan the online listings and will go to ONE (maybe two) sales per weekend and get there before it opens on the first day and grab the good stuff.

So if you get there later, its already been scavenged a lot… But don’t fret there is some hope..

If you can’t make it in the first hour, try to go the last two hours of the sale.

There will be stuff that the sellers price too high and they’ll be sitting there all throughout the sale. In the last hour or two of the last day, they’ll be willing to make a deal. Being that Jackie and I did hit some sales during the last two hours of the sale, we saw them drop the prices 50% and even 75% automatically. It sounds like its a standard practice across the board, so if you see something expensive, you might want to go back – if its still there…

The prices on the sticker are only a “suggestion”

Still feeling some guilt from last week, Jackie and I didn’t want to insult the memory of the owner by trying to bargain with the sale people. When we asked the price of 25 Matchbox cars from 1979, he told us a dollar a car. We politely declined and were ready to leave. Then he told us we could have all the cars for $10 – which was definitely worth it.

Not all sellers will do this, but give it a shot…

Cash is king, and very few estate sales deliver.

None of the places I went to accepted credit cards or checks… It makes sense I guess, but it wasn’t obvious to me. I wouldn’t take a check from many of the people I ran across during my 2 days there.

Also, only one estate sale was willing to deliver items (for an extra fee). Again, it makes sense, but not obvious to me at first… Especially since theres always a lot of heavy furniture being sold at these auctions, so if you plan to buy anything big, mnake sure you have big burly friends available that day to help you home with stuff…

It looks like many of the sales will let you buy the item and come back that day to pick it up… I’m not 100% sure as I didn’t buy anything big enough to carry, but I saw a lot of SOLD stickers on big items…

Oh yeah, and here’s a big tip that you may not know…

Don’t assume the food is for customers

I had to leave the room during an incident at one of the sales this morning because I was laughing so hard. The seller had a box of cupcakes on their table – presumedly for the people working the sale. One of the customers decided to open the box and take one. The sales person got REALLY nasty with the guy about how bold he was and they started arguing.

I had to leave because these grownups were acting like children in their taunting each other and it was just ridiculous. Personally, I think this was the sellers fault for leaving the box right next to the register. I thought they were for the customers too, but I make it a point in life to not accept free food from random people I don’t know. Call me paranoid, but I don’t even take free samples in a supermarket.

Which brings me to my final point.

People just suck

Not everyone mind you, but you see a lot of clueless jackasses at these sales. Buyers AND sellers… Competition for dead people’s stuff really bring out the worst in people… I’ve seen people complaining loudly that the quality of the merchandise was horrible. I’ve had another buyer get too close to me when I picked up something that looked interesting, and I could hear her breathing start to get labored… When I put it down she picked it right up and realized it wasn’t anything spectacular and make some snorting noise – like it was my fault that she got excited over it. Calm down lady, you’ll have your chance to buy a dead person’s item soon enough…

So thats pretty much it. Jackie and I spent maybe 50 bucks over two weekends on matchbox cars, some dishes and other tsotchkas, but as you just saw, we got an education on estate sales… The bottom line is that I don’t have what it takes to be a good estate sales shopper… And I’m kinda OK with that… There has to be a better way to make some cash tho…

Will we go back? Right now, I’m gonna say no, but if i get a lead on a sale with some comics or 1970’s toys, we’re so there…

Now for the shameless plugs… I let you read the blog without bugging you, so indulge me on this please?

First off, I wrote a Book last year, called Lost Boys of the Bronx: The Oral History of the Ducky Boys Gang. It is about the real-life exploits of the Ducky Boys gang that was so terrifying in the 1979 movie The Wanderers. They also happened to roam the Bronx neighborhood that I grew up in in the early 1960s.

Secondly, I am currently writing a new book about the really cool people I have met doing this costuming thing. There are a lot of interesting stories about how and why people got into this hobby. Many people get into it for the nerdy and fun aspect of the hobby, but there is so much more to it – For example, The 501st and Rebel Legion devotes a LOT of time and energy into helping people (especially kids) who need it – Any given weekend, there are members of our group visiting hospitals, participating in charity walks and raising money and awareness for a variety of organizations (Make A Wish, FAAN, Autism Speaks, amongst many others) – So we’re not just geeks – we’re geeks that really try to make the world a better place…

Anyway, in this new book, I am looking for interesting stories of people who costume. It could be Star Wars or Star Trek related; It could be Superhero costuming; It could be Renaissance Faire, SCA or even LARPing; it could be Historical Re-Enacting; If you put a costume on outside of Halloween, I’d love to hear your story – so please drop me a line at JamesHannon@Lantern-Media.com – you could end up immortalized in a book. But please hurry – before I finish writing it.

And the third and final advertisement… I’ve been writing this blog for a while now, and there’s a lot of variation in my topics… There’s quite a few more costuming stories, some Bronx and Ducky Boys stories, reviews of movies, and concerts that I’ve been to, and tips for writers and/or procrastinators… Take a look thru the rest of them – I’m sure you’ll find something that interests you.

See, that wasn’t so bad was it? Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time!

So back in September,2011, my wonderful niece Heather Guglielmo (who is an aspiring actress) sent me a link to a Kickstarter project for a movie called “The Barn” that she was going to be in with her Portland, Maine film-making director friend Corey Norman from Bonfire Films. I had seen a bunch of their previous stuff and I was impressed on how good they were for being self-funded projects, but I was impressed to see they were going the Kickstarter route and taking their productions to a whole new level… So of course I donated to the cause – Sure, I think they are very talented, but lets face it – if my niece is a part of it, I’m absolutely donating…

As a sign of how good these guys had gotten, they were asking for $500 to cover their basic production costs, and by their Kickstarter end-date of October 2nd, they almost-quadrupled that with $1,975! Which meant they were going to add some real production value to this movie! I was excited to see what they’d do with the extra money because they have pulled off some impressive movies with no funding…

So once they got the money they got to work right away – like setting up locations, building props (like coffins), etc. And Heather would tell me all about the shooting, etc… Within weeks after they started, they got all their principal photography done, and the film was in the editing room…

A few weeks after that, they are announcing their release date of December 5th, 2011 at the Nickelodeon Cinema in Portland! I just want to note it was 2 months and 3 days after they officially started! And as you’ll see later it was a half-hour movie with a lot of actors and special effects… So they kicked ass in getting it done quickly..

Sadly I couldn’t make the premiere, but I heard that it was SOLD OUT and people were being turned away – which was awesome for the cast and crew. Now I just had to wait for the DVD to see it. I got it a few weeks back and watched it within minutes of getting the package in the mail.

And I loved it! It was even better than the trailer would lead me to believe. The director Corey Norman did a wonderful job making this movie LOOK like a big-budget movie. The story was great, effects were awesome, the actors were professional quality, and the cinematography was gorgeous..

There is one thing I REALLY didn’t like about it though… THERE WASN’T NEARLY ENOUGH HEATHER GUGLIELMO SCENES!!! (Just remember, I said this was a BIASED review) It sounds like Heathers been in the main cast of a LOT of previous Bonfire movies, and they didn’t want to overuse her, but as her uncle and godfather, I disagree with that 100% For future reference, please remember this mantra: More Heather equals More Better!

Ok, now that I got that off my chest, now I can get back to being as unbiased as I can be with this review. Also, I promise I wont give away any spoilers without adequate warning.

Writers Tyler Wood, Christopher Moulton & Rebecca Johnson did a great job of telling the story of how a supernatural force turned a small town in Maine upside down. Appropriate that this short film was shot in Maine, as there definitely was some inspiration from Stephen King’s “The TommyKnockers” here. I never saw the movie version of that, but the feel of this movie is what I imagined when reading the book. For the record, it seems to be inspired by Stephen King, but The Barn is a fresh original story on its own merit.

The actors were phenomenal – I’ve seen many of these actors in previous Bonfire and other of Heather’s projects, and they always do a great job. Regular Bonfire actor Daniel Noel as Skip perfected the role of the creepy outsider who you wouldn’t want living near you. Jack Tracksler was an absolutely perfect small town Preacher. Peter Campbell who played Jake has the right feel of a kid from a crappy home life who doesn’t want to, but keeps finding himself in situations that will send him down that path. Erik Probst who played Bobby was so good at his role of some sort of special needs kid, that I had to ask Heather if he really was (He’s not as seen in the bonus footage on the DVD).. And of course, best newcomer award at the Oscars should go to Heather Guglielmo for her role here as the unfortunately named teacher called Ms. Blood (supposedly the real name of one of the writer’s teachers)… (You knew I couldn’t leave her out LOL). The rest of the cast were great too, but I had to limit the praise here or I’d be going 10 pages longer.

As I mentioned before, director Corey Norman is great at directing, but the real reason this film is so awesome is that he has some great people collaborating with him. Kenn Gonneville is the cinematographer and co-writer Tyler Wood was the video editor of the Barn. And no joke, they should win many awards for their skills here. The whole look of The Barn is gorgeous from the scenery and the camera angles to the final glossy end product. Just watch the trailer below to see what I mean.

Bottom Line: I loved The Barn (even tho there wasn’t enough Heather scenes) – I told Heather as soon as I saw the trailer that this movie has the potential to take off big time and change the cast & crew’s life. And After watching the actual movie, I am convinced that it will… Looking at the KickStarter page’s updates, I saw that it is already getting interest from a few festivals and reviewers. And all I can say about that is that I’ll be able to say that I was a small part (thanks to Kickstarter) of a movie that launched a bunch of careers…

Look for more information on this chilling new entry from Bonfire Films, the folks that brought you: Just Dating, Valentine, Affliction, Inn Season and Last Chance to Reason’s “Upload Complete” music video.

Plot Outline

A small town is rocked by a supernatural force that has been claiming lives for the past twenty years. A coming of age story, THE BARN, chronicles a young boy uncovering the shadow cast over the town and its inhabitants as he witnesses unexplainable phenomena.

]]>http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/03/09/review_thebarn_bonfirefilms/feed/0Costumer Video Series 1-3: Sandtrooper, Biker Scout and TIE Pilot Armorhttp://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/03/08/costumevideoseries_123/
http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/03/08/costumevideoseries_123/#commentsThu, 08 Mar 2012 18:54:22 +0000http://jameshannon.com/wp/?p=3070Summary: Author, film-maker and costumer James Hannon takes you through the first 3 videos in a series showing how to put on various Star Wars costumes from the 501st Legion’s NorthEast Remnant (NER) Garrison. Designed to show people all the intricacies that these costumes have that make them look as tho the wearer has just walked off the movie screen and into reality. Covering the Sandtrooper (TD), BikerScout (TB), and TIE Pilot costumes in these videos with more to come shortly.

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Back in 2009, I joined the 501st Legion. In case you don’t know what that is, it’s a volunteer fan organization where its members dress in screen-accurate Star Wars “bad guy” costumes and go out to various comic conventions, charity and corporate events to promote Star Wars. Lucasfilm gave us permission to do this, and have regularly used us for various events over the years.

Here in New Jersey, my local group is the 501st NorthEast Remnant Garrison. I’m currently the Garrison Public Relations Officer (GPR) and I’m tasked with helping to promote the group – which is easy because the group does some great work with charity organizations.

One of the things we decided to do is create a series of videos to show how to put on various Star Wars costumes. Some of the costumes we have are pretty complicated to put on, and these videos were designed as a look behind-the-scenes and see how everything fits together. Many times in the dressing rooms for 501st events, troopers help each other get dressed, and while doing this, we gain an appreciation for other costumes… And being that our troopers learned stuff about other’s costumes, it stands to reason that others would be to. And this was the inspiration for this series of videos…

Just a quick ending note. Joining the 501st, I’ve met a lot of great new friends out there, did some good in the world, and had some interesting adventures along the way. As a matter of fact, I found things so interesting that I decided to write a book about the experiences of all the cool people I have met during the way. Hopefully it will be ready by October 2011, and I’m busting my butt trying to make that happen.

By the way, other than a couple stragglers, the main interviews for the book are done… But if you are reading this, and think you have the coolest costuming story ever, feel free to email me at JamesHannon@Lantern-Media.com and let me know – Until I lock the book down, I’ll gladly listen to (or read) any experiences that you have in the costuming world that you think the world needs to hear…

]]>http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/03/08/costumevideoseries_123/feed/0New Year Resolutions from the Dalai Lama & Ben Franklinhttp://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/01/12/newyearsresolutionsfromthemasters/
http://jameshannon.com/wp/2012/01/12/newyearsresolutionsfromthemasters/#commentsThu, 12 Jan 2012 17:00:52 +0000http://jameshannon.com/wp/?p=3032Ok, its close to New Years, so everybody is worrying about resolutions and reminiscing about old resolutions that didn’t work… So author James Hannon decides to share two guides to a successful life from two successful people who aren’t currently trying to sell you an entire package for hundreds of dollars… Hey, it can’t hurt, and can only help, so why not give it a shot?

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Ok, this is gonna be easy to write. I’m basically gonna steal two lists of life principals from two great writers, thinkers, and humanitarians and tell you to follow their rules… It could very well be a Twitter or Facebook update to give you motivation, but I didn’t want it to scroll off within 20 minutes after posting it – I plan to look at the list regularly during my life.. As I’ve said before, sometimes these blog entries are more for me – but if it helps someone else, all the better

The first is from the Dalai Lama… Now don’t get scared – you don’t have to give up your current religion to follow these – they are practical and simple guidelines that should be a part of EVERY religion. Even Carl from Caddyshack gets it (See the end of this blog for the video)

Take into account that great love and great achievements involve great risk.

When you lose, don’t lose the lesson.

Follow the three R’s:
– Respect for self,
– Respect for others and
– Responsibility for all your actions.

Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck

Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.

Don’t let a little dispute injure a great relationship.

When you realize you’ve made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.

Spend some time alone every day.

Open your arms to change, but don’t let go of your values.

Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.

Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you’ll be able to enjoy it a second time.

A loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life.

In disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don’t bring up the past.

Share your knowledge. It is a way to achieve immortality.

Be gentle with the earth.

Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before.

Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other exceeds your need for each other.

Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.

If you want others to be happy, practice compassion.

If you want to be happy, practice compassion

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For the second list, I’m going to go wayyyy back to Colonial times and one of the Founding Fathers – Thats right – Benjamin (freakin’) Franklin. I’m referencing the man on the hundred dollar bill, so you know he’s got his stuff together… I’ve been reading his biography from Walter Isaacson (the same guy who wrote the Steve Jobs one) and its been an eye opener for me.

Old Ben wasn’t always “old” – He was actually only 20 years old when he developed this list of things he needed to work on to make his character better. Apparently it worked since 220 years after his death, people are still talking about him being one of the greatest historical figures ever. ( I’m sitting on my hands trying not to give you a history lesson of everything he’s ever done, but this isn’t the forum for that – Seriously, pick up the Walter Isaacson biography – you’ll love it…)

One of the coolest things about Ben is that he created this list because he knew he wasn’t perfect. But he wanted to try to become as close to perfect as he could… He failed at the items on the list plenty of times during his life – but he kept trying, and even tho he failed often, that trying made him do did better than most…

Another cool thing is that he didnt even try to work on them all at the same time… He specifically worked on only one of them a week and let the others happen as normal. He worked on the first one for a week, and then hoping “something stuck”, he moved on to the next one… He even developed a chart of his virtues, and put a mark when he failed – That chart had a lot of erasings as he re-used it over and over… You have to love a guy who knows where he’s weak and tries to fix it…

So now without further adieu, I give you:

Benjamin Franklin ‘s Thirteen Virtues of Life

Ben Franklin has heard all the excuses and still thinks you can do it

Stolen verbatim from Wikipedia altho inspired to steal based on Walter Isaacson’s book “Benjamin Franklin: An American Life” (which is great so far)

Temperance. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.

Silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.

Order. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.

Resolution. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.

Frugality. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.

Industry. Lose no time; be always employ’d in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.

Sincerity. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.

Justice. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.

Moderation. Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.

Cleanliness. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, cloaths, or habitation.

Tranquility. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.

Chastity. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.

Humility. Imitate Jesus and Socrates

Almost 300 years after he wrote this, they are still relevant… If you need help translating Ye Olde English, do a Google search, or email me and I’ll give you “my” version of what I think they mean, but like anything, it will come with my personal viewpoint.

So there, if you want some good direction to your life, why not at least take a shot on two very successful people who are not trying to sell you an entire kit of how to live better… Hmmm, maybe I should develop a kit based on these principals??? Hmmmmm…

Thanks for reading and I hope this helps you get on a path to being better – whatever that specifically means to you..
-=James

Now for the shameless plugs… I let you read the blog without bugging you, so indulge me on this please?

First off, I wrote a Book last year, called Lost Boys of the Bronx: The Oral History of the Ducky Boys Gang. It is about the real-life exploits of the Ducky Boys gang that was so terrifying in the 1979 movie The Wanderers. They also happened to roam the Bronx neighborhood that I grew up in in the early 1960s.

Secondly, I am currently writing a new book about the really cool people I have met doing this costuming thing. There are a lot of interesting stories about how and why people got into this hobby. Many people get into it for the nerdy and fun aspect of the hobby, but there is so much more to it – For example, The 501st and Rebel Legion devotes a LOT of time and energy into helping people (especially kids) who need it – Any given weekend, there are members of our group visiting hospitals, participating in charity walks and raising money and awareness for a variety of organizations (Make A Wish, FAAN, Autism Speaks, amongst many others) – So we’re not just geeks – we’re geeks that really try to make the world a better place…

Anyway, in this new book, I am looking for interesting stories of people who costume. It could be Star Wars or Star Trek related; It could be Superhero costuming; It could be Renaissance Faire, SCA or even LARPing; it could be Historical Re-Enacting; If you put a costume on outside of Halloween, I’d love to hear your story – so please drop me a line at JamesHannon@Lantern-Media.com – you could end up immortalized in a book. But please hurry – before I finish writing it.

And the third and final advertisement… I’ve been writing this blog for a while now, and there’s a lot of variation in my topics… There’s quite a few more costuming stories, some Bronx and Ducky Boys stories, reviews of movies, and concerts that I’ve been to, and tips for writers and/or procrastinators… Take a look thru the rest of them – I’m sure you’ll find something that interests you.

See, that wasn’t so bad was it? Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time!

On 12/05/2011, we lost a local Bronx legend. Ducky Girl Phyllis Carpenella-Germano passed away. If her name doesn’t ring a bell, you were probably not living in the Norwood area of the Bronx during the early-mid 60’s. During the course of my Ducky Boy interviews, I got to know her a little bit, and found out she still had that rebellious spirit she had back when she was a member of the infamous Ducky Boys gang…

Dec 31st, 2011

On this last day of 2011, I was going thru my to-do list, and writing this blog was at the top of the list. For athe last few weeks, I kept putting it off because I knew it would be awkward to write since I didn’t really know Phyllis “the person” all that well. But she was one of the first interviews I did for my book on the Ducky Boys gang, and she really showed me what I had gotten myself into…

On May 27th, 2006, I met Phyllis for the first time in Bronx Park. My friend and ex-Ducky Girl Geri Gertler-Norcross set up the meeting with Phyllis and Lenny Lim (also one of the original Ducky Boys).

Read that entry (it’s not too long)… But it shows just how fearless and bad-ass Phyllis was throughout her life… At almost 60 years old, she and Lenny climbed over a barbed-wire fence just to send a middle finger to the Botanical Gardens who had put this fence up to block people from getting to the Twin Lakes section for free. In talking to Phyllis & Lenny that day, I found that they were two of the most honest interviewees EVER. Neither of them were embarrassed nor apologetic of anything she did back in the Ducky Boys heyday.

I have to admit that I was a little intimidated by this 5 foot, 100 pound (if she was soaking wet) woman… Phyllis was still a tough cookie, and could still kick major ass. Read my book, Lost Boys of the Bronx to see all the gang fights she was in, including fighting tooth and nail with the boys (who weren’t taking it easy on her because she was a girl – they were fighting her at full capacity)

Over the years I was working on the book, I also found that EVERYBODY who hung out in the neighborhood knew Phyllis and were not ashamed to admit that they also were a little intimidated by her as well… I had went to a neighborhood reunion and everyone there had stories of just how tough she was, and how nobody wanted to be on her bad side.

After the Ducky Boys, she rolled with a motorcycle club and was even featured in a June 7th, 1998 NY Times article (See picture)

Phyllis was one of my best interviews. She was tough, honest, and fearless… I wish I knew her better than I did, but she probably would’ve kicked my ass at one point or another

The world is less interesting without Phyllis in it… Rest in Peace…

My description of Phyllis from Lost Boys of the Bronx

Phyllis Carpenella-GermanoPhyllis was co-leader of the Ducky Girls. Phyllis was one of the tiniest Ducky Girls, but also widely known as one of the toughest members in the gang. She was always the first to jump into a fight – regardless of the size or gender of her opponent. In May 2006, as she was approaching her sixtieth birthday, I interviewed Phyllis on location “Down the Ducky.” During the interview she walked into a dark tunnel in the middle of nowhere just to show kindness to a homeless guy. And later she scaled a barbed-wire fence to send a middle finger to the Botanical Gardens for putting it there. This woman has no fear whatsoever!

If you knew Phyllis at any time in her life, please post a comment or story about her below… Please be respectful…

Thanks for reading
-=James

]]>http://jameshannon.com/wp/2011/12/31/duckygirlphyllis_rip/feed/10So I helped ring the opening bell at the NASDAQ stock market….http://jameshannon.com/wp/2011/12/20/nasdaqopeningbell/
http://jameshannon.com/wp/2011/12/20/nasdaqopeningbell/#commentsTue, 20 Dec 2011 20:47:33 +0000http://jameshannon.com/wp/?p=2958On Dec 20th, 2011, author James Hannon helped ring the opening bell of the NASDAQ Stock Market along with his Star Wars loving geek brothers in the 501st Legion‘s Empire City Garrison, NorthEast Remnant Garrison, and the Rebel Legion. It was an event to signify the release of the EA/BioWare videogame “The Old Republic” and that Electronic Arts was changing its ticker to EA on the NASDAQ stock exchange. This is the story of that day.

——————————————————————————————————–

Well, I just woke up after taking a well-deserved nap today. You see, I had to get up at 5am this morning to be in the heart of Times Square in New York City by 7:30am – And I was shooting to be there at 7am since I didn’t want to be late, so I gave myself a half-hour putz factor. (Remind me at some future date to talk about the “putz factor” dynamic LOL)

Now, for those of you that don’t know me very well, getting up at 5am is usually reserved for something special. And today was definitely a day that it was worth getting up at 5am…

Today, I got to help ring the opening bell at the NASDAQ stock exchange in Times Square!

Here’s what happened:

Electronic Arts was scheduled to ring the bell today to signify its changing of its ticker to EA on the NASDAQ stock exchange. Also, along with it’s subsidiary company BioWare, it was having a HUGE release event for their videogame “The Old Republic” that came out at Midnight last night.

And EA/BioWare asked the Empire City Garrison (the NYC branch of the 501st Legion – which is the Star Wars costuming group that I belong to) to provide someStar Wars characters to the ceremony. They agreed, and graciously asked the NorthEast Remnant (The NJ branch of the 501st) if we had any folk who could show up for this mid-week and early event. Terry “Bro” Browning and I jumped at the chance since it was one of those once-in-a-lifetime troops.

People have asked me “How did you get chosen for this?” – Well the answer is simple – I had a 501st/Rebel Legion approved Star Wars costume and I was able and willing to go. The EA/BioWare/NASDAQ people would have gladly had another 5-9 costumers show up. (One day, remind me to write up a blog about how to get a a 501st/Rebel Legion approved Star Wars costume if you’re interested.)

Well, we got to the NASDAQ on time, the NASDAQ staffers brought us to our changing room (I’m kinda surprised how many people thought I drove into the city with my costume on – without the helmet of course), and once we were changed we were brought out to take some promo pictures with the staff as well as take a souvenir picture that they gave us to take home with us…

Then they lead us into the “bell ringing studio” which had a huge window to the street level of Times Square… Some more promo pictures, some impromptu interacting with the passerby outside the windows, and then we set up for the bell ringing ceremony.

At about 9:15am, we went live and the NASDAQ executive came on and introduced the president of EA Labels, Frank Gibeau – who spoke a little bit and then introduced the BioWare co-founders Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk. Then NASDAQ gave EA the ceremonial “bell ringer” crystal, and at 9:30am, Frank Gibeau rang the bell and we took a few more promotional pictures..

The video is also on NASDAQ.com for Dec 20th, 2011, but I’ve heard
a few complaints that people had problems opening the video there.

Once the bell appearance was over, they brought us out to the center of Times Square for some more promo pictures against the NASDAQ building backdrop. Where we were surrounded…

Maybe I think too cinematically, but just picture looking down from the top of the building where you see an overhead view of people milling about slowly at any given time. When we walked out there, picture *everybody* in Times Square swarming towards us and eventually surrounding us… It was pretty damn cool…

After what felt like a million pictures out there, they had us turn around and watch our TV appearance on the full-size building length video screen above Times Square… It was wicked cool (and I REALLY don’t use that term very often) – We enjoyed our celebrity for a few more minutes and then headed back inside where we were told we were done and could leave..

We went back to the changing room,and changed… We grabbed our plastic tubs with costumes and put them in the coat check area, and went out for breakfast at the Brooklyn Diner across the street – compliments of EA/BioWare.

Its funny, just a few minutes earlier we were rock stars in Times Square, but as we went outside in civilian clothes, we were completely ignored – Its a weird feeling LOL

Ok, back to the Brooklyn Diner…. Bro and I had scrambled eggs – Bro had pancakes, and I had french fries (a diner without home fries? – the shame! To add insult to injury, the combined cost (incl tip) for both Bro & I was $60.00!!! For scrambled eggs!! I know Times Square is a huge tourist trap, but why the hell do people put up with these prices?? And the place was PACKED at 10:30am! If I were footing the bill myself, I would be outraged… The scrambled eggs were good, but not worth $30 a person! (I told my niece later that I felt like John Travolta ordering a 5-dollar milkshake in Pulp Fiction LOL)

Afterwards, we picked up our stuff, and went our separate ways home… personally when I got home, I took a nice long nap which I woke up from not too long ago…LOL

It was a great troop – The EA/BioWare/NASDAQ people really treated us right and it was a smooth troop – I was surprised how laid back it was for such a high profile event. I would definitely recommend doing this type of troop if you get the chance…

Now for the shameless plugs… I let you read the blog without bugging you, so indulge me on this please?

First off, I wrote a Book last year, called Lost Boys of the Bronx: The Oral History of the Ducky Boys Gang. It is about the real-life exploits of the Ducky Boys gang that was so terrifying in the 1979 movie The Wanderers. They also happened to roam the Bronx neighborhood that I grew up in in the early 1960s.

Secondly, I am currently writing a new book about the really cool people I have met doing this costuming thing. There are a lot of interesting stories about how and why people got into this hobby. Many people get into it for the nerdy and fun aspect of the hobby, but there is so much more to it – For example, The 501st and Rebel Legion devotes a LOT of time and energy into helping people (especially kids) who need it – Any given weekend, there are members of our group visiting hospitals, participating in charity walks and raising money and awareness for a variety of organizations (Make A Wish, FAAN, Autism Speaks, amongst many others) – So we’re not just geeks – we’re geeks that really try to make the world a better place…

Anyway, in this new book, I am looking for interesting stories of people who costume. It could be Star Wars or Star Trek related; It could be Superhero costuming; It could be Renaissance Faire, SCA or even LARPing; it could be Historical Re-Enacting; If you put a costume on outside of Halloween, I’d love to hear your story – so please drop me a line at JamesHannon@Lantern-Media.com – you could end up immortalized in a book. But please hurry – before I finish writing it.

And the third and final advertisement… I’ve been writing this blog for a while now, and there’s a lot of variation in my topics… There’s quite a few more costuming stories, some Bronx and Ducky Boys stories, reviews of movies, and concerts that I’ve been to, and tips for writers and/or procrastinators… Take a look thru the rest of them at the main page of http://jameshannon.com/wp – I’m sure you’ll find something that interests you.

See, that wasn’t so bad was it? Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time!